Amphibia-Reptilia - Brill

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Scope
Amphibia-Reptilia (AMRE) is a leading European multi-disciplinary journal devoted to most of the
aspects of herpetology: ecology, behaviour, evolution, conservation, physiology, morphology,
paleontology, genetics, and systematics. Amphibia-Reptilia publishes high quality original papers, short-
notes, reviews, book reviews and news of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica (SEH). The Societas
Europaea Herpteologica (SEH) website is located at: seh-herpetology.org.

Ethical and Legal Conditions
The publication of a manuscript in a peer-reviewed work is expected to follow standards of ethical
behaviour for all parties involved in the act of publishing: authors, editors, and reviewers. Authors,
editors, and reviewers should thoroughly acquaint themselves with Brill’s publication ethics, which may
be downloaded here: brill.com/page/ethics/publication-ethics-cope-compliance.

Online Submission
AMRE uses online submission only. Authors should submit their manuscript online via the Editorial
Manager (EM) online submission system at: amre.editorialmanager.com/. First-time users of EM need to
register first. Go to the website and click on the "Register Now" link in the login menu. Enter the
information requested. During registration, you can fill in your username and password. If you should
forget your Username and Password, click on the "send login details" link in the login section, and enter
your e-mail address exactly as you entered it when you registered. Your access codes will then be e-
mailed to you.
Prior to submission, authors are encouraged to read the ‘Instructions for Authors’. When submitting via
the website, you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of the various files.
A revised document is uploaded the same way as the initial submission. The system automatically
generates an electronic (PDF) proof, which is then used for reviewing purposes. All correspondence,
including the editor’s request for revision and final decision, is sent by e-mail.

Choosing Editors in EM
During the submission process, authors will be requested to select one of the three co-editors of the
journal, according to the subject area of the manuscript:

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Conservation of reptiles
Ecology
Paleontology
Other
                  José Carlos Brito
                  InBIO & CIBIO, Vairão
                  jcbrito@cibio.up.pt

Evolution, genetics and biogeography
Morphology
Physiology
Systematics
                  Salvador Carranza
                  Institute of Evolutionary Biology (CSIC-UPF), Barcelona
                  salvador.carranza@ibe.upf-csic.es

Behaviour
Conservation of amphibians
Diseases
                  Eva Ringler
                  Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University of Bern, Hinterkappelen
                  eva.ringler@iee.unibe.ch

Each co-editor can assign the manuscripts to themself, to another co-editor or to an associate editor.
When handled by an associate editor, all communications finally go through the co-editor in charge of
the manuscript. Editors must be contacted using Editorial Manager.

File Formats
The submission must consist of a single text file (.doc, .docx, .odt) for the text, tables and figure legends.
For figures, .eps, .jpeg, .tiff, .gif, .pdf or .doc files should be used (with one figure per page).
Figures should not be embedded in an MS Word file but in their initial software. A figure containing
several parts must be saved as a single file. To guarantee good resolution in printing, colour figures
should be saved as an original .tiff or .eps file with an original resolution of 600 or 1200 dpi. Files for
colour figures should be submitted in CMYK and not in RGB format.
If tables create problems with their placement within the main MS Word file, they can be uploaded
separately. All hyperlinks and field codes (e.g., from bibliographic databases) must be removed.

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Manuscripts in which the track change procedure of MS Word was used must be carefully checked for
final acceptance of all corrections and removal of marginal comments.
One pdf of all the separate files will be automatically generated by Editorial Manager.

Review Process
All manuscripts that are not editorially rejected or sent back for correction according to the instructions
for authors are sent out for peer review. Manuscripts are usually reviewed by at least two external
reviewers, one of the two co-editors and possibly an associate editor. Both external reviewers and
members of the advisory editorial board can be selected to review a paper. Reviewers are given five days
to take in charge a manuscript and then a maximum of three weeks to return their comments via the
web platform. The first decision is usually made within one to two months of receipt. Authors must
resubmit their manuscript within six weeks of receipt of the decision letter (4 weeks for subsequent
submissions), except in cases of personal arrangements made with the co-editors. In sending their
revision, authors must provide a separate letter (reply to reviewer letter) in which they paste the
comments of the reviewers and their responses directly under each point raised. Revised manuscripts
can be sent to reviewers again.
The average time from submission to publication is currently only 6 months. It is expected to be even
shorter in the near future, when individual articles will be become available online in advance of the
journal issue.

Supplementary Media / Data Files
To support and enhance your manuscript, AMRE accepts electronic supplementary material, including
supporting applications, high-resolution images, background datasets, sound or video clips, large
appendices, data tables and other items that cannot be included in the article PDF itself. Authors should
submit the material in electronic format together with the other manuscript files and supply a concise
and descriptive caption for each file. In order to ensure that your submitted material is directly usable,
please provide the data in one of the broadly accepted file formats for video, audio, etc. and limit the file
size (e.g., for video: max. 3 GB). Supplementary files supplied will be published online at FigShare
(www.figshare.com), to which reference is made in the published article on Brill Online Books and
Journals, and vice versa.
Supplementary text, tables and figures, movies and sounds should be prepared in their final intended
format by the authors. For these text files, text should be preceded by a centred title header including
the following on separate lines:
         - Amphibia-Reptilia (Times New Roman, italics, 9 pt)
         - Article title (Times New Roman, 14 pt)
         - First name + initial + family name of each author, with several authors separated by commas
         (Times New Roman, 12 pt)

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
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Instructions for Authors

        - Authors affiliations as in the main document (Times New Roman, 9 pt)
The heading "Supplementary material" (centred, Times New Roman, bold, 12 pt) should then be followed
by the supplementary text, tables and figures. Main text should be single spaced, concise, justified-
aligned, in font type Times New Roman at size 12 pt.
In the main text of the document, these should be referred to as “supplementary
table/figure/text/movie/sound S1” upon first mention, and subsequently “table/figure/text/material S1”.
The supplementary file should be submitted in .doc(x) format and will be published online in .pdf
format. In the case of supplementary movie or audio files, please contact the editor for details.

Contact Address
For any questions or problems relating to your manuscript please contact: amre@brill.com. For eventual
questions about Editorial Manager, authors can also contact the Brill EM Support Department at:
em@brill.com.

Please, note, that manuscripts submitted after 20th of December will not be considered before the 10th of
January next year.

Submission Requirements

Types of Contributions
There are several categories of papers:
Reviews must be written by specialists in the field and focus on hot topics or subjects not reviewed
recently in the literature.
Manuscripts that are solely descriptive; purely faunistic (e.g., species check-list); provide simple range
updates or report distribution novelties without analyses; based only on captive breeding; consisting
only of a juxtaposition of non-connected fields; based on a too small a sample size; or contain reports of
work that appear to contravene accepted principles of conservation or ethical standards, may be
rejected without external review. Manuscripts should preferably be grounded in research questions, and
those based in hypothesis testing have better chances to be sent to external review. Moreover, the
research must adhere to the legal requirements of the country in which the work was carried out. As the
Atlas of European Amphibians and Reptiles (NA2RE) is one of the main projects of SEH, Amphibia-
Reptilia welcomes update papers on European herpetofauna, but these papers should summarize the
distribution of species complexes or higher level taxa (preferably genera or family level), should provide
new results (e.g. SNP data) and should adhere to the above mentioned criteria. Papers providing simple
range updates are recommended to be submitted to the sister journal Herpetology Notes. Papers
describing new species are more likely to be considered if they offer broad discussion, present several

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

new species, and are based on a sufficient number of specimens. Otherwise editorial rejection may apply.
Amphibia-Reptilia does not accept manuscripts priorly submitted to preprint servers.
Manuscripts that do not follow the editorial style will not be considered for publication and will be sent
back to the authors.
The latest instructions for authors are available on Editorial Manager (amre.edmgr.com), from
seh-herpetology.org/journals/amphibia-reptilia and
brill.com/files/brill.nl/specific/authors_instructions/AMRE.pdf. Recent issues of Amphibia-Reptilia may
also be consulted before submitting a manuscript. Some papers are available without charge on the
BrillOnline Platform for the Journal at brill.com/view/journals/amre/amre-overview.xml.

Language
Manuscripts should be in English, using British spelling and grammar. Spelling should be consistent
throughout. If English is not an author’s first language, authors may consult an English native speaker to
improve and check the language of their manuscript.

Length
Articles cannot be longer than 8000 words (with 6 tables or figures), short notes are limited to 3000
words (2 tables or figures) and reviews to 12 000 words.
If authors feel that manuscripts intended as an article will suffer severely from the requested word count
threshold, they should contact one of the respective co-editors prior to submission (pre-submission
inquiry) in order to find out whether an exception is justified or not in a specific case.

Manuscript Structure

General
Manuscripts must be formatted using double-spacing, with wide margins (3 cm), and with continuous
page and line numbering throughout the entire text.
It is mandatory that each manuscript is accompanied by a cover letter in which the authors state why
their findings are new and important, and therefore should be published in Amphibia-Reptilia.
The first page of all manuscripts must contain the title in lower case letters, the first and last names of all
authors (no initials; a coma separates each author name, including the two last ones), the affiliation and
address of each author, including the e-mail address of the corresponding author (manuscripts without a
valid e-mail address will not be considered), the type of manuscript (article, short-note or review) and
the total number of words in the whole manuscript (reference list, captions, and tables included), and in
the abstract.
Short notes must be prepared without dividing the text into sections, but must contain an abstract.

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Articles should be assembled in the following order (after the title page): abstract, keywords,
introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, acknowledgements, references, tables, figure
legends (grouped together), figures (one per page). Figures should not be embedded in the manuscript
file (see below).

Abstract
The abstract should present a brief summary of the topic, including its aims, results and the relevance of
the work. It should be presented in only one language (English) and be no longer than the recommended
length (maximum 250 words for articles and reviews, 150 words for short notes).

Keywords
Four to eight keywords must be presented after the abstract. They should be different from the words
used in the title of the manuscript.

Headings
The main headings are written in bold, the second level headings in italics.

New Paragraphs
Paragraphs must be indented (except after headings) and not separated from each other by an empty
line.

Italics
The scientific names of species should be in italics.

Introduction
The introduction should clearly state the objectives of the study and place it within the context of
previous publications. Conceptual introductions are preferred over descriptive texts. The introduction
should not merely describe a study species or group but give an overview of a more general topic in
herpetology and possibly other organismic groups. In other words, a paper cannot be justified just
because a species is threatened or because natural history data are lacking.

Materials and Methods
These should be presented in a smaller font than the rest of the manuscript (e.g., Times New Roman 10 vs
12). Furthermore, they should be explained in enough detail to allow replication. The sample sizes and
the number of independent replicates should be clearly stated. For experimental work details on both
housing and observational conditions should be stated. Environmental conditions should be controlled
as much as possible to avoid biased results. The exact dates or period of sampling and observation must

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

be given. For studies based on a small number of study sites, the geographic coordinates must be
indicated. Statistics should be explained in the methods, particularly when complex models are used.

Results
Anecdotal results should not be presented unless they are of primary importance. Instead, they should
be stated in the discussion section as personal observations. Results should focus on the main
argument(s) of the manuscript. Comparisons should be tested statistically. Sample sizes should be
clearly presented.

Discussion
The results should be discussed in the context of the existing literature. The discussion should not focus
only on the study species or group, but should be placed into the context of arguments about other
model species to render it in a more conceptual and broad concept. The literature should be covered in
sufficient detail for both the topic and the study group. Each paragraph should focus on a different idea,
but very short paragraphs should be combined with other paragraphs. The discussion must not be overly
long. Speculation should be avoided.

References
Text Citations
These should be presented in chronological order as follows: Petranka (1998) or (Griffiths, 1996;
Michimae and Wakahara, 2001; Schmidt, Feldman and Schaub, 2005). Where there are more than three
authors, only the first should be named, followed by “et al.” (not in italics). Both the introduction and
discussion must include an adequate number of citations for effective arguments to be established.

Reference List
In the list, references should be listed in alphabetical, and then chronological order, under the first
author’s name and should refer only to publications cited in the text. List references with three or more
author names must be placed after those with two. Journal names must be abbreviated according to the
official abbreviation. Many abbreviations are, for instance, available at: cassi.cas.org/search.jsp. No space
must be inserted between the initials of the first names. No empty lines must be inserted between
references. Volume numbers are written in bold. The two last authors or editors in a citation are
separated only by a comma. Abstracts of conferences should not be listed in the reference list, but cited
in the text as unpublished data or personal observation. The references of the species description (e.g.
Linnaeus, 1758) are not necessarily included in Reference List.
References must be typed in the following order and form, respectively:
     − Arnold 2002
     − Arnold 2003

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

    − Arnold, Peterson 2002
    − Arnold, Pfrender, Jones 2001
    − Myers, E.M., Zamudio, K.R. (2004): Multiple paternity in an aggregate breeding amphibian: the
      effect of reproductive skew on estimates of male reproductive success. Mol. Ecol. 13: 1951-1963.
    − Kiesecker, J.M. (2003): Invasive species as a global problem. Toward understanding the
      worldwide decline of amphibians. In: Amphibian Conservation, p. 113-126. Semlitsch, R.D., Ed.,
      Washington, Smithsonian.
    − Zug, G.R., Vitt, L.J., Caldwell, J.P. (2001): Herpetology. An Introductory Biology of Amphibians
      and Reptiles, 2nd Edition. San Diego, Academic Press.

The use of bibliographic software such as Endnote is recommended to format the references correctly.
Independently of using such software, all references must be checked one by one accordingly to our
guidelines. In particular, a great deal of attention needs to be paid to the abbreviations of journal names,
as they do not depend directly on the downloadable style sheet.

Acknowledgements
These should be kept brief, but funding agencies should be listed. If legal requirements are necessary for
the study, the collecting permits must be cited with reference to the institution who issued them.
Individuals are identified by their last name and the initials of their first name.

Statistics
Means and standard errors (SE) / deviations (SD) or medians and quartiles or ranges should be given as:
mean ± SE = 5.3 ± 0.3 mm. If equations or special symbols such as the mean are used, the module MS
Equation in MS Word must be used (available in “Insert Object”). Statistical symbols, such as n, F, t, U, Z,
r must be indicated in italics. Degrees of freedom are indicated as a subscript to the test statistic (F2,265, t17).
The name of the test should be given on its first appearance in front of the symbol (e.g., ANOVA, Mann-
Whitney). The same test should be applied to the same kinds of analyses throughout the manuscript. P
values for significant results should be quoted as below a threshold significance value (P < 0.05, P < 0.01,
P < 0.001). Exact probabilities should be given for non-significant results (e.g. P = 0.76). Multiple post-hoc
tests must be used with caution to avoid experimental error by chance alone. When transformations are
used, they should be stated in the materials and methods. The multiple use of individuals should be
controlled for or avoided. Multivariate analyses are usually requested when several explanatory variables
are tested for one dependent variable or when one explanatory variable is expected to explain several
dependent variables.

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Abbreviations
The International System of Units should be used. Do not employ unexplained abbreviations for
institutions, etc.

Ethics
Authors should explain and justify, in a cover letter and in their manuscript, all techniques which have
resulted in injuries or death of animals. Failing to do so will necessitate editorial rejection of the paper.
In the Materials and Methods section of the manuscript, authors should detail as precisely as possible
the conditions of maintenance, transport, anaesthesia, and marking of animals. When available,
references should be added to justify that the techniques used were not inappropriately invasive. When
alternative techniques exist to euthanasia, but were not used, the manuscripts may not be considered for
publication.

Figures
All illustrations should be drawn to fit into one (66 mm) or two columns (139 mm) of a journal page.
Lettering and numbering should be large enough to be clearly visible when the illustration is reduced to
published size. When several graphs are presented in the same figure, they should be as homogeneous as
possible (i.e., the same range of values on the axes; avoidance of repetition in the different graphs). Maps
must include geographic coordinates, the indication of North, and a graphic scale. All symbols should be
explained within the figure or in the legend.
Authors should upload figure files as separate files. These figure files must be uploaded as source files
(.jpeg, or .tif), and not .pdfs. The quality of the figure must be suitable for printing - the resolution should
be a minimum of 300 dpi (minimum 600 dpi for line art). The image itself must be sharp, and any text in
the figure should be legible (at least corps 7 or larger). Figures to be printed in grey scale must not
contain colour. Poor quality figures may compromise acceptance.
The number of illustrations should not be too excessive given the length of the text.

Colour Figures
There is no charge for full colour images or figures in either the print or electronic edition.

Tables
These should be numbered consecutively with Arabic numbers (in bold font) and submitted on separate
pages. The table must be drawn using a table editor. This means that the space or tab function cannot be
used. A recently published table should be used as a reference for constructing tables in the correct style.
Vertical lines are not allowed, and horizontal lines must be limited to the minimum. According to their
size, tables should be assembled to fit into one (66 mm) or two columns (139 mm) of a journal page. Very
small tables should be avoided, and their results placed in the text.

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Copyright
The use of general descriptive names, trademarks, etc., in this publication, even if the former are not
specifically identified, is not to be taken as a sign that such names are exempt from the relevant
protective laws and regulations and may accordingly be used freely by anyone.

Publication

Proofs
Upon acceptance, a PDF of the article proofs will be sent to authors along with a list of instructions as an
attachment by e-mail to check carefully for factual and typographic errors. Corrections of the proofs are
limited to typographical errors. The list of corrections must be sent to the publisher, within two weeks of
receipt, by e-mail or fax. In the absence of comments from the authors, the proofs will be considered as
publishable. The costs of any other changes, involving time-consuming and expensive work, will be
charged to author(s). If absolutely necessary, additions may be made at the end of the paper in a “Note
added in proof”. Manuscripts will be published without proofreading by the authors if they change their
e-mail address without updating their personal data in Editorial Manager, or if they do not provide their
corrections on time.

Page Charge
There is no page charge.

E-offprints
A PDF file of the article will be supplied free of charge by the publisher to authors for personal use. Brill
is a RoMEO yellow publisher. The Author retains the right to self-archive the submitted (pre-peer-review)
version of the article at any time. The submitted version of an article is the author's version that has not
been peer-reviewed, nor had any value added to it by Brill (such as formatting or copy editing). The
Author retains the right to self-archive the accepted (peer-reviewed) version without any embargo
period. The accepted version means the version which has been accepted for publication and contains
all revisions made after peer reviewing and copy editing, but has not yet been typeset in the publisher’s
lay-out. The publisher’s lay-out must not be used in any repository or on any website
(brill.com/page/RightsPermissions/rights-and-permissions).

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

Consent to Publish

Transfer of Copyright
By submitting a manuscript, the author agrees that the copyright for the article is transferred to the
publisher if and when the article is accepted for publication. For that purpose the author needs to sign
the Consent to Publish which will be sent with the first proofs of the manuscript.

Open Access
Should the author wish to publish the article in Open Access he/she can choose the Brill Open option.
This allows for non-exclusive Open Access publication under a Creative Commons license in exchange
for an Article Publication Charge (APC), upon signing a special Brill Open Consent to Publish Form.
More information on Brill Open can be found on brill.com/brillopen.
A discount of 40% is given to corresponding authors who are SEH members (with membership
including subscription to Amphibia-Reptilia – print or online version) at the time of submission. Proof of
member-ship (payment of SEH invoice) should be presented to the Co-Editor in Charge when the
manuscript is accepted.

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Amphibia-Reptilia
Publication of the Societas Europaea Herpetologica
brill.com/amre

Instructions for Authors

More on the Editorial Style, or How to Avoid Not Having a Ms Sent Directly
for Peer Review

When a manuscript does not conform to the Instructions for Authors, it will be sent back to authors. To
avoid this type of time loss in the submission process, authors are kindly requested to carefully check the
Instructions for authors before submission of their manuscript.
The main reasons that render a manuscript unsuitable in reference to the editorial style of Amphibia-
Reptilia are listed hereunder, although this list is not exhaustive:
   - Incorrect style of references in the text or in the reference list (e.g. no "and" between authors,
     volume number must be in bold, journal names must be abbreviated, mismatches between
     references in the text and the list; in the text: et al. for papers of more than three authors, not two).
   - Incorrect style for n, P and statistical symbols (all must be in italics).
   - Lack of keywords.
   - Lack of abstract.
   - List of authors and addresses on the title page not correctly formulated.
   - Absence of double line spacing.
   - Presence of empty lines between paragraphs.
   - Pages and lines not numbered.
   - Tables not presented as in the published papers (no vertical lines, use the table function in Word).
   - Low resolution pictures (72 instead of 300-600 dpi).
   - Figures that do not accord with the defined style (for maps: coordinates, North; for all figures: all
     symbols explained, a font that is not too small).
   - Absence of acknowledgements for capture permit.
   - Failure to remove comments from the right-hand column, presence of endnote fields or of
     automatic footnotes.

We recommend that junior, inexperienced and first time authors consult any papers that are online in
open access, also see the supplementary material online.

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